GONZO’S HEAVY ROUNDUP, SEPTEMBER 2021

 Album Reviews, Exceptions to the Rule, Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  No Responses »
Oct 012021
 


Unto Others

(NCS contributor Gonzo returns with another end-of-month roundup of music that caught his ears.)

There are a few bittersweet observations I’ve come to realize in the past month, related both to music and to the endless hellscape that is the human condition:

As of this writing, 2022 is just three months away and I’m still processing whether 2020 was even real. This means that while I survived the endlessly overwhelming shitstorm of that year, it does beg the question of how much worse this planet could get for humans over the next decade.

While live music is back and I’ve been reveling in the joy of sweaty venues and the sleep deprivation that comes with festivals again, I was just notified that Judas Priest is postponing the rest of their tour due to Richie Faulkner’s heart condition.

The next date would’ve been where I would see them (for the first time, no less) here in Denver.

Fuck.

The good news? Sabaton, who opened for Priest on this tour, is still playing a show in Denver, and by the time this piece goes to print, I’ll have seen the show and will post a full review in the coming days.

In the meantime, I’m at least somewhat distracted by the troves of amazing heavy music that keep blasting out of the darkest corners of the netherverse as of late.

Join me as I take you through some unfettered heaviness and savagery that’s emerged in the past month and kept me sane as we descend into 2021’s final few months. This month, I’ve got two albums and three singles for you to delve into. Continue reading »

AN NCS ALBUM PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): BIAŁYWILK — “PRÓŻNIA”

 Album Reviews, Premieres  No Responses »
Oct 012021
 

 

Fans of Chicago’s Vukari will want to pay special attention to the following album premiere on the day of its release. Entitled Próżnia, it’s the debut full-length by the atmospheric black metal band Bialywilk, which is the solo side project of leading Vukari member Marek Cimochowicz. For this album, he’s also aided by an impressive group of session musicians — drummer John Kerr (Marsh Dweller, Noltem, Seidr), bassist Spenser Morris (Vukari), and Adam Harris, who performs synths on “Próżnia I”.

The title of the album is a Polish word that refers to the void — to the vacuum of space. Although Próżnia is not a concept album, the songs do deal with space and celestial realms, as well as mysticism and philosophical subjects. As Marek has explained to us: “So, overall the inspiration is about space and the void, but how vast and humbling it could be to the human experience. We are all part of the universe in a way but our bodies and consciousness are just a blip in the grander scheme, and as bleak as that sounds I find it pretty relieving”.

As you will discover, the music fits the grand and momentous themes of the lyrics, creating panoramas of blazing splendor that channel moods of awe, fear, and loss, coupled with heart-pounding rhythmic propulsion and vocals of harrowing intensity — and a couple of gripping ambient excursions into the void of deep space. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: ADLIGA — “ŽYVY” (ALIVE)

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Oct 012021
 

 

Today it is our pleasure to present a striking video for a powerful song off the forthcoming debut album by the band Adliga from Minsk, Belarus. The album, Vobrazy (set for release on November 5th), features six songs with lyrics in the Belarusian language, some based on Belarusian folklore, and in their music the band interweave elements of doom and post-metal with vocals that exhibit great variety and range.

The song featured in the video we’re premiering is “Žyvy” (Alive). Its lyrics narrate a horrible dream, in which all life has been extinguished, the earth laid waste in blood and fire, and the observer struggles to make sense of how to exist. The narrative, which includes ruminations about destiny, ends with these words, translated from the Belarusian:

Here you are alone, and your life is at stake.
Death’s call has sounded,
This round you’ve almost lost

And clenching my teeth,
And pulse beats in temple,
Only one thought – I’m alive!
Alive!
Alive! Continue reading »

AN NCS INTERVIEW: GLOOSH

 Interviews  2 Responses »
Oct 012021
 

 

(Comrade Aleks has again brought us a very interesting conversation with a very engaging personality, and this time it’s George Gabrielyan, the man behind the black metal band Gloosh from Siberian Russia, whose new album is being released today.)

Gloosh means “thick forest” or “backwoods” in Russian, a fitting title for  a black metal band from Siberia, isn’t it? It’s a one-man band / studio project started by George Gabrielyan just two years ago, and there are already one EP and two full-length albums in the Gloosh discography. This black metal has a strong “atmospheric” aspect and the lyrics are written and performed into Russian, though you can find the translations in Metal-Archives or Bandcamp, ‘cause George cares for the band’s followers.

Well, actually the second album named Sylvan Coven is just being released today, and it’s a good reason to interview George. But besides that news, George has much more to tell, as he does play nowadays in two more black metal bands – Eoront and Frozenwoods — so he seems to be the right person to know about a few more subjects, and not only about his own path to the blackened underground but also about the Siberian scene in general. Continue reading »

AN NCS INTERVIEW: LUCIFER

 Interviews  1 Response »
Sep 302021
 

 

(DJ Jet returns to NCS with the following interview of Johanna Platow Andersson, vocalist of the Swedish/German band Lucifer, whose new album Lucifer IV will be released on October 29th by Century Media. Credit for all photos accompanying the interview goes to Ester Segarra.)

 

Johanna we must start at the beginning back when you were an adolescent. Tell us about your family.

Both my father and step-father were photographers and my mother was very musical. I grew up with a brother, eleven years older than me and was always surrounded by art, books and music. We traveled a lot every year, I guess to compensate for having been locked up behind the iron curtain before we moved from east to west Berlin in 1985 when I was six.

 

What was it like for you as a kid to move  to West Berlin when “The Wall” was still in place?

It was a culture shock but a good one. It made me an outsider at school. It shaped me and made me very adaptable to anything life throws at me. Continue reading »

AN NCS ALBUM PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): MALGÖTH — “GLORY THROUGH SAVAGERY”

 Album Reviews, Premieres  2 Responses »
Sep 302021
 

 

Of all the titles that Malgöth might have chosen for their debut album, the one they picked is a near-perfect representation of the music: Glory Through Savagery. The experience is indeed one of breathtaking ferocity and destructive impact, but both the band and the songs also revel in their psychotic excesses, creating a continuous atmosphere of no-holds-barred derangement that glories in the chaos they create.

While the album maintains connections to the vaunted traditions of malignant Canadian blackened death metal, it carves its own abominable path in unorthodox yet still terrifying ways. The music is not merely a titan of globe-spanning ruination but it’s also delirious — and deliriously inventive. The press materials for Iron Bonehead Productions, who will release the album tomorrow (October 1st), describe it as “a kaleidoscopic experience, a fever dream of war metal turned absolutely inside out”, and that’s absolutely true — as you’re about to find out through our premiere of a complete album stream. Continue reading »

AN NCS VIDEO PREMIERE: AYAHUASCA — “CENDRES ET RUINES”

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Sep 302021
 

 

Right here, right now, we have a great example of why music videos can matter. This one checks all the boxes: Highly energetic performances by the band members (who seem to be having a hell of a time), expertly filmed and edited; a creative depiction of an incendiary event that’s central to the lyrical theme of the song; and of course the success of the video in introducing some very good music to people who might never have been aware of it (including this writer).

The song is “Cendres et Ruines” (“Ashes and Ruins”) by the German progressive death metal band Ayahuasca. The song was originally released on Ahayuasca‘s 2018 debut album Beneath the Mind. Obviously, a lot of time passed in between the release of the album and today’s unveiling of the video. In that time a lot has happened, not only in the wider world but also in the life of this band, including line-up changes. And thus, as the band say, the video marks the end of one volume in their life, in advance of something new to come. And not surprisingly, the video itself required a lot of time and effort by a lot of people to bring it to fruition (you’ll see the names of many of them at the end of the video). Continue reading »

THE SYNN REPORT (PART 138): REDEMPTUS

 THE SYNN REPORT  No Responses »
Sep 302021
 

Recommended for fans of: Isis, Sumac, Old Man Gloom

The central thesis of this site has always been to primarily focus our attention and efforts on the underdogs, the underrated, and the underappreciated of the Metal scene.

Of course, exactly who qualifies for this is somewhat debatable, especially when it comes to the regular retrospective provided by The Synn Report, where we’re just as likely to go to bat for a “big” name whose work we think has been undervalued or unfairly maligned as we are for a relatively unknown band whose merits have gone unsung for far too long.

Today’s edition definitely leans more towards the latter than the former, as while Portuguese trio Redemptus aren’t an entirely unknown quantity, they’ve definitely been dwelling below the radar for far too long in my/our opinion, and it’s high time that more people were made aware of the group’s abrasively aggressive and asphyxiatingly atmospheric blend of sludgy Hardcore and punky Post-Metal.

Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: EXSUL — “PSYCHOMACHIA”

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Sep 292021
 

 

In writing about new music I sometimes become intrigued by the titles of records or songs, or by conceptual themes or cover art, even if none of that may have anything to do with the experience of listening. Driven by nothing more than intellectual curiosity, I find myself tunneling down internet rabbit holes to satisfy that curiosity, and maybe to learn something new along the way. That happened in spades with Allegoresis, the forthcoming second EP by the Tucson-based death metal band Exsul.

There were already manifold hints of Exsul’s unusual intellectual interests in the song titles on their 2020 self-titled debut EP, and even more so in the titles strewn across their new one. Consider the name of the first song that was revealed from Allegoresis: “How in the Land of Satin We Saw Hearsay, Who Kept a School of Vouching“.

At first I thought this might just be clever wordplay, substituting “Satin” for you-know-who and “Hearsay” for “Heresy”. But my researching revealed that it is instead the title of Chapter XXXI of The Fifth Book by the French Renaissance writer, physician, humanist, monk, and Greek scholar François Rabelais.

And that isn’t the only reference to a Rabelaisian work in the songcraft of Exsul. There’s another song on the new EP named “Pantagruelion“, which I discovered is a name given by Rabelais to “a magical plant capable through its many applications of furthering the progress of the human race”. It appears in The Third Book (Le Tiers Livre in French), yet another book of the heroic deeds and sayings of the giant kings Gargantua and Pantagruel.

And then there’s “Psychomachia“, the name of the song we’re premiering today. Here’s what you’ll find about “Psychomachia” in The Font of All Human Knowledge: Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: LE CHANT NOIR — “LES MÉTAMORPHOSES DU VAMPIRE”

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Sep 292021
 

 

Imagine yourself as a character in a waking dream, finding yourself transported centuries into the past and venturing into a French cabaret populated by aristocratic Satanists and those practicing medieval witchcraft, with vampires roaming in their midst, draining blood from crystal goblets instead of wine. Imagining such a scene, an unreal dreamscape of ancient elegance and palpable danger, is one way of preparing yourself for the music to be found on the new second album by the Brazilian “supergroup” Le Chant Noir.

That album, La Société Satanique Des Poètes Morts, is set for release by Personal Records on October 22nd. As the press materials faithfully describe it, the songs “thread together the darkest fibers of archaic black metal, doom metal, and even dark metal, arriving at a sort of avant-garde symphonic black metal that’s simultaneously an authentic throwback and refreshingly modern”.

The album is indeed an out-of-the-ordinary experience, a kind of macabre musical theater that proves to be genuinely transportive. Even the one song we’re premiering today has that effect. Its name is “Les Métamorphoses Du Vampire“. Continue reading »

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